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Thursday, June 21, 2012

NOTHERN EXPOSURE: Purity Ring

It’s not very often that a band can get me really excited on the basis of only a handful of songs. Austra did it last year before the release of their fantastic album Feel It Break, and this year Purity Ring are doing it this year with the upcoming release of their debut album Shrines. I really think that I'm even more enamoured with Purity Ring this year than I was with Austra last year, and Feel It Break ended up being my number two album of the year, so who knows where Purity Ring’s Shrines might land at the end of this year. Regardless of exactly where, I'm expecting it to be high.

Purity Ring is of course the duo of Megan James and Corin Roddick, who is formerly of the band Gobble Gobble (who now go by the name Born Gold). Purity Ring actually share some similarities with Born Gold, both are in the realm of what you might call “future pop”, however, both bands have very different takes on the genre. While Born Gold goes at an absolutely frenetic pace, Purity Ring appears to have a much more methodical and deliberate delivery to their music.

Describing Purity Ring’s sound is kind of a difficult task for me, but I know that they've created something really unique. It almost reminds me a bit of the self titled release from Zammuto that came out earlier this year. It’s mostly because of the overall choppy feel and pop sensibilities of all the songs that I've heard from Purity Ring so far that I relate them to Zammuto. However, Purity Ring has a much more dark vibe to their music. The haunting down-pitched vocals in the background litter their chopped up and skittery electronics, it just sends chills up my spine sometimes. On top of that Megan James’ voice is so floaty and airy, it only adds to all the creepiness going on.

I do find it kind of weird that a band can garner this my hype around the internet based only off the release of a few singles last year (which were amazing) and a couple of cuts that have been released so far from Shrines. I guess that really shows the power of the internet. Either way, I think that Purity Ring deserve all of the hype and popularity that they’re getting. It’s always great to hear a band come along who is doing something fresh and exciting. I hope everybody else is as excited to hear their debut album as I am because in this case, I highly doubt the hype machine will disappoint.